My name is Debs and I want to welcome you to Mad Wisdom, a podcast designed to investigate and create a new conversation around mental health. One filled with compassion and hope. Having been on a long journey with my mental health (including a number of different diagnoses and various medications) I decided to turn my back on the mental health system and take the wellbeing of my mind into my own hands. More and more of us are being diagnosed with mental illnesses and disorders and being put on medication (1 in 4 people in some communities in the west are now on anti-depressants) and this podcast is for anyone who wants to challenge the belief that we are suffering from a 'chemical imbalance' and find other ways to handle the emotional distress which comes as part of being human.

I'll be looking at the language of mental health (disorder, illness, diagnoses, drugs), the ways in which the mental health 'sector' has grown and how we can create a new way of describing what most of experience at some point in our lifetime. I'll be talking to doctors, psychaitrists, authors, scientists, people with lived experience of diagnosis, those who have recovered, and those determined to do so. I'll also be looking at how different cultures and societies view mental health, and learning from parts of the world where rates of depression and anxiety are particularly low. I believe we are born with innate mental health and that our societal structures are taking us further and further away from this norm. I hope you'll join me and we can take our minds into our own hands.